VOA慢速英语--梅茜头号粉丝走红网络

（单词翻译）

AS IT IS 2016-02-03 Lionel Messi's Biggest Fan 梅茜头号粉丝走红网络

Last month, a 5-year-old boy in Afghanistan became famous on the Internet. A photograph of him went viral. That means people around the world saw the picture, and shared it with their friends and followers¹.

The boy was wearing a Lionel Messi soccer jersey² made from a plastic bag.

Messi plays soccer -- a game known as football to most of the world -- for Argentina’s national team.He also plays for the Barcelona club team. The 5-year-old used a blue-and-white striped bag to recreate Messi’s Argentina jersey. He wrote “Messi" and the number 10 on the back.

The boy’s name is Murtaza Ahmadi. He became so famous that the Afghanistan Football Federation³ began working to set up a meeting between him and the sports star.

This week, the Afghanistan Football Federation told the media that Messi’s representatives have been in contact. An Afghan federation official told The Guardian⁴ newspaper that if Messi could not meet with Murtaza in Afghanistan, the federation would fly the boy to meet with him in Spain.

Also this week, new photos of the 5-year-old have gone viral. This time, though, he is wearing an official Messi jersey from his Barcelona club team.

Words in This Story

viral - adj. relating to or involving an image or video that spreads rapidly and widely from one Internet user to another.

jersey - n. a loose shirt worn by a member of a sports team as part of a uniform

striped - adj. having stripes or bands of color

federation - n. an organization that is made by joining together smaller organizations